Study Says Hands Off Cable Tv County Attorney Warns Against Anti-porn Law

July 8, 1986|By Lynne Bumpus-Hooper of The Sentinel Staff

TITUSVILLE — Brevard County commissioners should not try to regulate cable television programs unless they are willing to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars defending it in court, County Attorney William Curphey said.

Commissioners asked Curphey to research the issue after the county was asked to pass an ordinance preventing pornography on cable television. H. C. Williamson, a Titusville resident and a member of the Citizens of Responsible Government, made the request.

Curphey's opinion went to commissioners last week. They are scheduled to discuss the issue again today in their 9 a.m. meeting at the Merritt Island Central Services Complex.

Curphey said a recent ruling by state Attorney General Jim Smith prohibits counties from taking on that regulatory role. State law assigns the role to the Legislature; it does not set up any guidelines under which the companies must operate.

''I also, in my opinion, told commissioners we could take on the challenge, but they would have to count on the case going to the U.S. Supreme Court before it was settled and then, once an ordinance was passed, having that also go to Washington. It would be a prolonged, lengthy legal battle,'' Curphey said.

Williamson said that in light of Smith's ruling, he will revise his request. Instead of an ordinance, Williamson wants the commission to inform the attorney general of its opposition to cable television pornography.

He also has asked the commission to amend the franchises between the county and the cable companies to prohibit material that ''goes beyond the community standard of decency.'' Williamson said he believes the commission could set that decency standard.

But Curphey said state law prohibits the commission from regulating the contents of cable television.

''They cannot get into what the company can disseminate, only how they can disseminate it,'' Curphey said.

Williamson said material he and others consider pornographic has appeared on pay movie channels such as Showtime, Home Box Office and the Playboy channel as well as MTV and other cable stations. Some programming on national networks such as NBC-TV and ABC-TV approaches pornography, he said.

''We're not trying to censor what's on television. We only want the broadcasters to be encouraged to drop programming that contains explicit or violent sex,'' Williamson said.